534 PARKS 



In the beginning of a new system the service functions as outlined 

 on page 533 would be reversed. Planning and landscape design, design of 

 structures, and construction engineering would come first. These would no 

 doubt require the intensive and active services of the legal division. The 

 office division would at once begin to function also. Probably the next in 

 order would be the maintenance and guard services followed by the various 

 social-recreational features. In an established system the emphasis would be 

 upon the recreational-social-educational services, the services involved in 

 maintenance, legal advice, architectural and landscape planning and design 

 being auxiliary and aids to the use services. 



For a large system two assistant superintendents are suggested, one 

 being highly trained in the organization and conduct of recreational-social 

 service activities and the other in those fields of activities pertaining to 

 material properties and equipment. Municipal athletics would include golf, 

 swimming and water sports of all kinds in addition to the usual highly 

 organized major and minor games and sports. The division of information 

 and service would include educational publicity and cooperative services 

 with all manner of private organized groups and institutions and with 

 public agencies and institutions. It might possibly include the operation 

 of community centers, although this could be set up as a separate division. 

 The horticultural division would, of course, include the propagation, plant- 

 ing and care of all kinds of plants used in landscape work in addition to 

 general supervision of special institutions and activities of the types men- 

 tioned. Other use divisions might be found necessary, such as a division 

 of municipal camps, a division of handicraft activities including farm 

 gardens, handicraft arts and similar activities. 



THE CHIEF EXECUTIVE OR SUPERINTENDENT 



Outstanding park systems in this country are outstanding chiefly be- 

 cause of the character, personality, vision, organizing power, business ability 

 and general efficiency of their chief executives or superintendents. The selec- 

 tion of this official is, without question, one of the most important of the 

 governmental acts of a governing authority. He is the official who must 

 translate the specific and general plans and policies of the governing authority 

 into concrete expression. His is the immediate controlling mind and direct- 

 ing force over all the executive functional services of the department. 



Type of chief executive needed in modern park systems. In that period of 

 park-recreation development in the United States when most public recrea- 

 tion areas, in design and treatment, were closely identified with the original 

 definition of a park, it was only natural that the superintendents chosen to 

 head executive organizations should have been men having horticultural 



